u/joshua0005

Last year I lived in Quetzaltenango, Guatemala for 3 months. I walked 90% of the time and the only times I felt unsafe were when the street dogs were aggressive to me. I even walked during the night and never felt unsafe but I tried to stick to big roads as much as possible due to the street dogs. I was obviously a foreigner there due to my skin tone, hair colour, and eye colour and I would be an obvious foreigner in 99% of Latin America because of that except for in Argentina, Brazil, and Uruguay.

Being able to walk around at night like I did in Quetzaltenango would be great but as long as I can walk around during the day without fearing for my safety I'm fine. I hate not being able to walk as part of the reason I don't like living in my home country is the lack of walkability. Getting in my steps for the day without even thinking about it is so nice.

It cost me about $1k USD a month for me to live there and I probably spent around $250 USD on fun money. I'm looking for a city with similar pricing but my budget is about $1.5k USD including fun money.

Want to spend about 1.5 months from mid October to late November in the Patagonia.

Doesn't matter if it's in Chile or Argentina but if I had to pick one it would be Argentina as I want to go to San Pedro de Atacama to go stargazing.

Basically I just want a place where I am reasonably safe, able to access nature easily, and able to find locals to do stuff with easily. Temperature doesn't matter but I'd prefer to avoid super touristy places as I want to speak Spanish as much as possible.

I want to go from approximately mid October to the end of March. So far I already know I want to go to Lima from the beginning of December to mid February. I'm looking for two more cities to go to for 1.5 months each; one from mid October to the end of November and one from mid February to the end of March.

Here is what I want in a city:

• Somewhere most people will speak to me in Spanish so no tourist towns like Puerto Vallarta
• Not the wet season or if it is the wet season somewhere that doesn't rain a lot during the wet season
• Daytime temperatures of at least 20c (68f). Nighttime temperatures and humidity (or lack thereof) don't matter at all. Would be willing to settle for 15c (59f) daytime temperatures
• My budget is $1.5k USD per month and must include all expenses besides flights
  • I'm a pretty frugal person I just want to skip the winter for a year and speak Spanish so I won't be living like the typical person who's traveling for one week would
• Any country besides Brazil, Peru, and Guatemala is fine
• At least 300k people and type of city doesn't matter (for example beach, mountains, etc)
• Easy to make friends with locals (or at least find people to hang out with)

If a city meets most of the requirements but not all of them feel free to suggest it. Only one that it must meet is the $1.5k monthly budget but other than that I don't require all of my wishes to be met.

I want to visit Latin America during these five months. I have a total budget of $15k, excluding flights. I speak fluent Spanish and I can get by in Portuguese so I do not want to go to extremely touristy places like Puerto Vallarta and Cancún.

I prefer slow traveling (1-2 months per city). This is because I am traveling partly to escape winter (I live in the Midwestern USA) and partly because I loved living in Latin America the first time I went. I want to go to three different cities in three different countries.

I already know that I want to visit Buenos Aires for two months and somewhere in Brazil and I'm not sure if Buenos Aires would be better in November and December or February and March.

I'm not sure about the third country and I'm not sure where in Brazil but I'd like to do 1.5 months in both locations and I don't want to spend any more than $1.5k USD a month if possible but I can go up to $2k. Here is what I'm looking for in these cities:

• Reasonably safe for my budget
• At least 300k population with no upper limit to the population
• Safe enough places to escape to nature. Bonus points if it's in an area with mountains/places to go hiking
• Not difficult to find locals (not other tourists!) to do stuff with even if we don't stay friends once I leave
• Not the rainy season and at least 20c (68f) as the high temperature most days and 15c (59f) every day (can be really hot and humid I don't care as long as it's not cold)